It's been a rather difficult financial year for Lotus as they posted a huge £71 million loss.

It's been a rather difficult financial year for Lotus as they posted a huge £71 million loss.

Although the numbers don't look good, it's actually less than half compared to the previous financial year (ended on March 31) when Lotus lost a whopping £168 million. Despite a one percent increase in the number of deliveries, Lotus managed to sell just 1,301 units which is why the company's CEO Jean-Marc Gales decided a few months ago to eliminate up to 325 jobs, representing almost 25 percent of the entire workforce.

The good news is since April 2014 they managed to deliver 1,448 units, representing a 55 percent increase compared to the same period of last year. Lotus estimates they will be able to shift 2,000 cars by the end of March 2015 also helped by the 19 dealers added in the previous financial year while an extra 21 will be opened until April.

There is a plan to get Lotus back into shape by launching new models in the near future, starting with the Exige S Automatic scheduled to go on sale next month. A more important introduction is expected in Geneva in March where Lotus will likely bring the facelifted Evora. There are also talks of an Evora-based crossover but even if green-lighted for production it's still several years off. Don't hold your breath for a production version of the promising Esprit concept from 2010 as Gales has already announced it won't happen, even though development was almost done when the project was canceled.

Lotus posts massive £71 million loss in financial year 2014, sold only 1,301 cars